Things That Keep me Awake at Night

Ok, here's a selection of "going away" anxieties....

1. Roof tiles will fall off the house and pierce the roof of the car while we're away

2. Roof of the car will leak water and interior will be ruined

3. The crack in ceiling of the bay window will continue to grow until the whole bay caves in.

4. Lots of spiders will come through the cracks in the floorboards and have noisy parties because they realise we are away

5. They will invite their slug mates

6. A bird will come down the chimney (this has happened 3 times in 8 years - last time, I threw a sheet over my head and ran away)

7. Mammoth frost will cause the water pipes to burst

8. An electrical short circuit will cause the house to burn down


Sometimes it's good to write it down............

Happy Christmas 2006

Three weeks to go and I still can't get my head around what we are about to do, even though our suitcases are in the bedroom and Ella's is half packed.

Ella was thoroughly grumpy yesterday and is still refusing to eat much other than cereal, bread and yoghurt. This could be a very interesting trip!

Why "The spinifex Option"

It strikes me that someone might ask me this.

This is the spinifex hopping mouse of Australia. He can be found going about his noctural business across the outback (or Back of Bourke as the aussies call it), but can also be glimpsed in the night time habitat display at Taronga Zoo in Sydney, where he impresses visitors with his industrious nature and very cute ears.

On visiting Taronga in 2002, I was very taken with this mouse, and, keen to return to Sydney at the earliest opportunity, wondered loudly and frequently when I would get the opportunity to make his reacquaintance.

We concluded that we would be likely to meet the mouse again if we decided to take the option for Darren to spend a year of his consultant training in Australia. This became known as us "taking the spinifex option".

You see, ostensibly, we are going to Sydney to further Darren's career prospects and spend some much needed time as a family in a healthcare system that does not routinely flog it's trainees half to death (hello Patricia Hewitt). Things have been very difficult for us with the long hours and ridiculous number of weekends that Darren has worked since Ella was born, so here's our chance to take some time out for what we've put in.

But actually it's all about the mouse.

The spinifex option has been our dream for the last 10 years, but only in 2002 did it acquire its name. We nearly bottled out after we had Ella, when we realised it was going to be far to much hassle, but since then we've also realised the truth in the adage that "life is not a dress rehearsal", so the spinifex option is what we're taking, and whether it's fabulous or awful, we will have done it, and it's the mouse we must thank.

Eight Weeks to Go.....

...and this is what happens to your career when you request a break from the NHS